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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25201228">sadness is a little boy looking out the window</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/we_are_the_same/pseuds/we_are_the_same'>we_are_the_same</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>One Direction (Band), Zayn Malik (Musician), zayn malik - Fandom</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bullying, Depressed Liam Payne, Depression, Emotional Hurt, Healing, Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Hurt Liam, Insecure Liam, M/M, POV Liam, References to Depression, Sad Liam, Strangers to Lovers, Suicidal Thoughts, Wordcount: 5.000-10.000, Wordplay Fic Challenge (One Direction), supportive family, supportive parents</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 10:00:10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,477</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25201228</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/we_are_the_same/pseuds/we_are_the_same</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Liam is twelve when he receives the key. It’s given to him on his birthday, in a red velvet box, and something about the weight of the box in his palm gives him pause, makes him hold his breath when he unwraps the bow around it.</p><p>The bronze key looks innocuous, but Liam knows better. He’s grown up with the stories, as many people have. Has been told about the keys, and that most people except for an unlucky few got one at birth. Some were immediately gifted to them by their parents, others had been kept away from them until such a time that they were deemed responsible enough to understand what it meant. </p><p>Because this kind of key, it doesn’t just open any door.</p><p>It reveals what you need most, when you need it most, and it can only be used once.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Zayn Malik/Liam Payne</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>70</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Prompt 2.4: Bronze</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>sadness is a little boy looking out the window</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This fic deals with some heavy themes, so be sure to check out the tags. I've dealt with a lot of bullying in my past, and I know sometimes it can still be triggering years later, but I also know that sometimes reading about it can actually feel cathartic. For those of you that have had these experiences and thoughts, know that I see you and I love you.</p><p>As always, thanks to the wonderful <a href="https://lightwoodsmagic.tumblr.com/">Sarah</a> for being my soundboard, my beta reader and my wonderful friend. You're exactly the kind of person I would've needed in my life when I was going through those tough times, and I'm so thankful to have you now.</p><p>Also a massive thank you to <a href="https://londonfoginacup.tumblr.com/">Emmu</a> for brainstorming with me and generally being an amazing person. I know I said it to you the other day over WhatsApp but I honestly wouldn't be where I was today if it weren't for you. You've made me a better writer and I will forever be grateful.</p><p>Thank you to my writers GC for throwing out associations when I was stuck on what to do for this prompt, and thank you to <a href="https://lululawrence.tumblr.com/">Sus</a> for making this Wordplay such a wonderful experience!</p><p>This is part of a Wordplay prompt challenge for the prompt "bronze". To read the amazing fics that were written by the others on this prompt, <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/collections/bronze">click here</a>, and to see all fics written as part of the challenge (including years 1-3), <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/collections/wordplay_fic_challenge/works">click here</a>. You can also find the masterpost for this year’s challenge <a href="https://wordplayfics.tumblr.com/post/622306139518926848/wordplay-2020-every-week-for-five-weeks-a-prompt">here</a>.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The key is heavy, in the boy’s hand. He clutches it to his chest, his fingers following the familiar intricate design on the bow, the bronze warm and alive against his skin. He prays, even though he doesn’t believe in God.</p><p>*</p><p>Liam is twelve when he receives the key. It’s given to him on his birthday, in a red velvet box, and something about the weight of the box in his palm gives him pause, makes him hold his breath when he unwraps the bow around it.</p><p>The bronze key looks innocuous, but Liam knows better. He’s grown up with the stories, as many people have. Has been told about the keys, and that most people except for an unlucky few got one at birth. Some were immediately gifted to them by their parents, others had been kept away from them until such a time that they were deemed responsible enough to understand what it meant. </p><p>Because this kind of key, it doesn’t just open any door.</p><p>It reveals what you need most, when you need it most, and it can only be used once. </p><p>Liam’s mum and dad still have their keys. Whatever they need most in their lives, they live happily without it. Their marriage is solid, they have three beautiful children, and though Liam occasionally catches his mother looking at her key - that she wears around her neck - she tells him she’s never felt the need to use it.</p><p>That’s important. Feeling the need. Liam knows it’d be a waste to open the door simply because he’s curious. Because whatever you need most in life can change. He knows, because Louis got his hands on his when he was six and found a chocolate bar and a teddy bear. </p><p>Keys are personal too. Liam’s is old and bronze, heavy, but his mum’s is delicate and silver, his dad’s a simple brass, with none of the elaborate detail that Liam’s key has. And yet they all fit the same door. A door that doesn’t truly exist in this universe, but that will nevertheless pop into existence when you reach out and pretend to open an invisible lock.</p><p>Liam’s always been very careful not to. </p><p>*</p><p>He does hold his key. A lot. It’s a physical reminder of <em>hope</em>, something that keeps him going through the darkest of his days. <em>Later</em>, he’s taught. He needs to use this later, when circumstances are dire and there’s no other way out.</p><p>Later, when he’s older. When he’s an adult. Later when he looks back on his life now and he can’t quite remember why he’d even think he’d need to use his key.</p><p>Later, when he has friends, and he knows how to defend himself against his bullies.</p><p>*</p><p>He doesn’t use the key when he’s fourteen and he gets chased home through the park. He comes home with grass stains on his knees and his heart pounding in his throat, but his mum’s there with a soft, soothing voice and a cup of tea, and she washes Liam’s knees like he’s still a little boy, and she lets him stay home from school the day afterwards.</p><p>Liam takes up running instead.</p><p>*</p><p>He doesn’t use the key when he’s fifteen and he gets cornered at school, gets called names like <em>fag</em> and <em>nancy boy</em>, gets shoved around and punched in the face because they claim he’s been looking at people funny in the showers after gym.</p><p>He wants to. He gets through the rest of his day thinking about it, but when he comes home, his mum and dad are there, and they’re so worried, so angry, and Liam doesn’t want to cry but he does, and by the time he gets up to his bedroom he just feels <em>tired</em>. Tired, but also so grateful, for having the family that he does.</p><p>*</p><p>He doesn’t even use the key on the night of his sixteenth birthday party, when he feels like a fool for ever thinking someone would show up. The balloons are still bobbing in the living room, the candles on the cake have long been removed, but Liam hasn’t been able to stomach a single bite. He’s just sat there, trying not to notice the sympathetic stares from his family, his fingernails digging hard enough into his skin to leave little half moon marks.</p><p><em>I can’t do this anymore</em>, he thinks, but still, he doesn’t use the key. He goes up to his room and takes his anger, his frustration, out on the punching bag his dad had installed for him. He punches it and envisions every single one of his bullies, punches it until his arms ache and his fingers are bruised. </p><p>He thinks of using the key. He also thinks of ending it all. But in the end, he just goes to bed.</p><p>*</p><p>Liam’s sixteen and a bit when he finally does use the key. </p><p>He’s stopped telling his parents about the bullying. Has learned how to hide it, after he’d overheard his mum crying one too many nights. It’s selfish of him, to place the burden of his suffering on anyone else, least of all his mum, who’s helped him so much over the years, who would bend over backwards and go to war for him if it made any difference.</p><p>He sees the way she looks at him in the mornings, the relief in her eyes when he comes back unharmed in the afternoon.</p><p>(He learns to wash up in the bathroom at school, learns to wait until people are gone. He doesn’t shower after gym anymore, he minimises the risk like it’s on him to do so. The bullies get smarter too, make sure to leave their bruises somewhere invisible, that they’re less likely to get in trouble for. Not that Liam ever says anything anymore. The school’s failed him enough.)</p><p>If only Louis was still here. He’s sure that things would be different. Louis had always known what to say to people who teased them. He’d always had a quick retort, something witty with a razor sharp edge. But Louis had moved away when his mum remarried, and Liam hasn’t even really spoken to him in the last five years.</p><p>He knows that’s his fault. He also knows that Louis is probably better off without him. </p><p>Those thoughts become more and more intrusive. The thought that everyone would be better off without him. He pushes himself harder, to be the kind of person his parents can be proud of. Gets straight A’s and makes the cut for his track team, but not even being part of a team changes anything. He’s still Liam, and for some reason that’s bad enough. They don’t even call him names anymore, just his own has a bad enough reputation. </p><p>He gets stronger, physically, but emotionally he’s weaker than ever.</p><p>It’s on the rare night that his parents go out and his sisters are all off doing their own thing, that Liam sneaks into the liquor cabinet. He knows it’s stupid. He knows he’ll get in trouble, but he’s been tripped no less than five times in track today, and his hands are stinging as badly as his eyes are, because even six hours after coming home he still feels like crying. </p><p>So he grabs the first bottle that’s within reach and takes it to his room. There’s stray thoughts of whether or not people would approve of him if he could hold his liquor, but he knows that even if he does, even if he’d show up to the party that’s planned (and that he’s not invited to) on Saturday, they would just make fun of him. For trying to impress them, for wanting their approval when they’ve never been nice to him. </p><p>The first shot burns badly enough that he nearly reconsiders. He gags when he swallows, tears in his eyes for another reason now, but with the sting comes something warm, something heady and cloudy that almost feels like confidence. </p><p>He takes another shot.</p><p>And another.</p><p>And another.</p><p>The thing about alcohol is, it can mask moods, but it can also enhance him. And Liam’s confidence, feeble on the best days, wavers, cracks under the weight of his self doubt. His depression.</p><p>It’s Thursday night, March 24th, and he thinks how easy it would be to end it all. He could sneak into his mum’s medicine cabinet the way he’d snuck into the liquor cabinet. Alcohol and pills seems like the safe, painless way to go. </p><p>But then, he wouldn’t want his parents to find him. He wouldn’t want to do that to them. </p><p>He could go somewhere. Jump in front of a train.</p><p>But that’s messy, and it could traumatize someone for life. And Liam isn’t sure he’d have the courage to actually jump in front of an oncoming train. </p><p>Hanging is out. It’s not foolproof and the only trees that are sturdy enough are near the playground, and that’s not something Liam would ever do to anyone. He tries so hard not to be a burden in life, he wouldn’t want to be one in death.</p><p>If only his parents hadn’t taken the car. He’s sure that he’d be able to make his way over to Quarry Lake, and just drive into the water. His dad’s taken him out a few times, taught him the basics about driving in an attempt to increase his general confidence, and with alcohol clouding his judgment he’s sure that he’d be able to get there. It’s late enough that most people are home, and early enough that the roads shouldn’t be crowded with people coming home from their evening plans. But they’ve taken the car, and Ruth would kill him if he took hers.</p><p>He blames the alcohol for the time it takes him to realize why that shouldn’t stop him. There’s bile in his throat but his heart is beating in his chest, because <em>he could take her car</em>. He just needs her key.</p><p>
  <em>The key.</em>
</p><p>It’s almost comical, how his mind’s been conjuring up all these scenarios all night, but not once has he given consideration to the key in his bedside table. </p><p>He’s stopped holding onto it, in the past couple of months. Knows that his parents have seen him asleep with it, because those nights he’s fallen asleep with it in his hand it’d inevitably end up in his bedside table in the morning. And the last thing he’s wanted was to worry them even more. </p><p>He also knows they’d disapprove of him using it so young. He’s supposed to be strong enough to be able to get through this. Years from now, they’ve told him, he’ll look back on his life and be glad that he didn’t use it. Years from now, he’ll know that worse was yet to come. </p><p>The thought of worse brings another wave of bile to his throat, brings fresh tears to his eyes. How should he be able to withstand worse when he can’t even handle this? Is he really that much of a coward? Is he really <em>that</em> pathetic?</p><p>His eyes have trouble focusing, but the weight of the bronze is familiar in his hand, the teeth on the blade digging into his palm, grounding him enough that for a few seconds he thinks he might actually make it. Might actually be okay.</p><p>And then his eyes flicker to his computer screen, and he remembers the hateful words left on Twitter, on Instagram, on all those accounts that he barely visits anymore but that still send him notifications of every bit of venom that’s been spat his way. </p><p>His hand is shaky as he holds out the key. His thoughts jumbled, but underneath the depression, the alcohol, the weight of his cowardice, is a tiny sliver of fierce hope. <em>Please.</em></p><p>*</p><p>Liam isn’t sure what he expected.</p><p>In part, it exceeds his expectations. Slowly, very slowly, a light starts filtering through the darkness of his room. A small vertical light, that grows and grows until he can see the shadows around it forming a door. A door that’s opening, but for now, Liam can only see brightness.</p><p>The brightness has a calming effect though. It’s sort of like how he’d imagine a guardian angel to look. This same slightly yellow, warm light that eases some of the ache in his heart, that makes him think <em>yeah, it’s all going to be okay</em>. It’s impossible to regret opening the door, and even though he’s well aware of the fact that this is the only time in his life he’ll ever be able to see what he’s looking at now, he knows he’ll never forget it. Will never forget the instant relief, the way his breathing eases and he doesn’t quite feel like crying anymore.</p><p>He brushes away the tears on his face, finds that now that his brain isn’t preoccupied with the sheer volume of his emotions, he actually feels curious. Wonders what it is that he needs most in the world. Wonders just how much his life will change.</p><p>The crack of light grows bigger, big enough for Liam to see the room behind it. It’s bathed in light, or no, it’s made of light. Yet somehow Liam doesn’t worry, doesn’t think twice about stepping inside once it’s big enough, knowing that wherever this door leads, he’s safe. </p><p>(There’s a part of him that wishes he could stay here. In the light, in the solitude, in the feeling that everything is okay)</p><p>It takes a moment, once he’s stepped inside, for his eyes to adjust to the light. He’d chalk it up to being drunk, or having been sat in a dark room for most of the night, but this is otherworldly. Liam knows, because he knows that right now, he’s sober. He’s not sure how it works and if he’ll step back into his room and feel dizzy and drunk again, but in this other realm (for lack of a better word) that he’s set foot in, all the worldly problems fall away. </p><p>There’s just light, and peace. And for a moment, everything is perfect. </p><p>And then he realizes that the room is empty.</p><p>*</p><p>He chokes back a sob, his fingernails digging into the palm of his hands again to stop the shaking. It can’t be empty. It can’t be that what he needs most of all is nothing. </p><p><em>Unless</em>, his brain starts, and the thought worms its way into his brain despite the light and peace that he’s feeling. Unless this is the path his life is meant to take. Unless what he really needs is for everything to stop. </p><p>Still. If that were the case, wouldn’t there be some clue after all? Even if it was just Ruth’s car keys, or something that’ll guarantee him an easy, painless death. </p><p>He can’t let himself believe that. That this is how it’s meant to go. That’s not in any of the stories he’s ever been told. There’s always <em>something</em>. It always changes lives, that’s the whole <em>point</em>.</p><p>But maybe his room <em>is</em> empty. Maybe he doesn’t need anything except hope, and there’s nothing tangible that can improve his situation. Maybe everything he needs is inside of him already. </p><p>He takes a deep breath, tries to fill himself with the light in the room, as though he’ll be able to take it back, will be able to cloak himself in light and wear it like armor, letting insults and fists bounce off of him, never letting anything slither into his heart or mind. </p><p>And then he sees it.</p><p>It’s small, and at the end of an endless room, but it’s there. Liam’s not sure how he’s even able to see it, because he shouldn’t be able to, it’s barely noticeable even when he’s got his eyes directly trained on it. But he sees it nonetheless. It’s lit up, like a beacon, and Liam finds himself heading towards it, not sure of what it will be but knowing that this is going to be what finally solves everything. </p><p>He’s not sure what he expected. </p><p>But it’s not this.</p><p>It’s not a <em>pencil</em>.</p><p>*</p><p>A pencil.</p><p>Liam, stupidly, wonders if it’s maybe a magical pencil. If it’ll transform, the moment he touches it. But it just feels and looks like any ordinary pencil. Like the ones Liam’s lost a hundred times over the course of his school life. </p><p>It’s deceptively light in his palm, and now that he’s picked it up it’s stopped emanating light, looks like anything else he might’ve picked up from his desk. </p><p>There’s a sinking feeling in his stomach, that he’s been lied to all his life. That no one actually believed the story about the keys, and that only Liam’s been tricked into thinking it meant anything. He knows better, knows that his mum and dad would never lie to him, but how can this be the thing he needs most in the entire world? </p><p>He’s of half a mind to leave it, to step back out into his room and forget this has ever happened, but before he can, the room literally expels him. The sinking feeling in his stomach gets worse and he’s jolted back into his bedroom, into darkness and onto a fluffy comforter. The key, bronze and beautiful, falls onto the rug with a soft <em>thud</em> as the door swings closed and Liam’s left staring at his wall again, no trace of another realm left behind.</p><p>Except for the key, he thinks, and maybe, he thinks, maybe this means something. Maybe this means that there’s something else he needs, maybe he gets another chance.</p><p>But then the key lights up, bright as the room it had opened up had been, and then vanishes with a soft <em>pop</em>. </p><p>*</p><p>He feels sick. He’s not sure if it’s the alcohol (thankfully, whatever magic had caused his inebriation to disappear had stuck with him, but his stomach still feels a little queasy), or just the sheer disappointment. For years he’s held onto this. Onto the knowledge that one day he’d have something that would change everything. That would put a stop to all the bullying, because Liam’s tried so hard but nothing has worked. It had always felt like a reassurance. That if he just got through this, and the next thing, and the next thing, without using the key, then he’d be rewarded. He felt <em>proud</em>, of getting through everything without using the key. It was something to hold onto. The knowledge that he hadn’t quite hit rock bottom yet.</p><p>Except now he has, and he’s somehow left still sinking.</p><p>*</p><p>He doesn’t move until he hears his parents’ car on the driveway. Just sits there, in total darkness, the pencil on the floor near the wall because he’d been unwilling to hold onto it, had tried to throw it in the direction of where the door had been as if that would somehow cause it to vanish into thin air. As though the door was still there even when Liam wasn’t able to see it.</p><p>It had just ricocheted off the wall and rolled against the edge of the rug, and Liam had left it there. </p><p>He picks it up now, stuffs it in his book bag, not because he thinks it’ll do him any good but because he doesn’t want his parents to come in to check on him and see it on the floor. He doesn’t want them to know, even though he logically understands that there’s no way that they will. He still doesn’t want them finding out that he’s let them down.</p><p>It’s too late to put away the bottle of alcohol, so he just hides it under his bed, resolves to try and sneak it back into the liquor cabinet in the morning. </p><p>He can hear his mum’s footsteps coming up the stairs, and in something that’s half impulse, half shame, he slips into bed, covers himself with the duvet, and pretends to be asleep.</p><p>*</p><p>He doesn’t remember actually falling asleep, but when he wakes up, his alarm is shrill in his ears and the world outside is grey and dreary, and Liam thinks that’s fitting. There’s a brief moment, as he first comes to, when he doesn’t remember, but he doesn’t even have to open up the drawer in his bedside table to realize. It’s quick, if not instantaneous, and for a moment Liam wonders if his mum will allow him to just stay in bed today.</p><p>But he wasn’t going to make her worry anymore. She’s meant to think that everything’s better, and Liam knows that she won’t believe that if he asks her to keep him home for the rest of the week. She’s going to see right through him, will know that he isn’t sick, and though Liam knows that she’d let him stay home he also knows that she’ll end up crying her eyes out to his dad later that night. It’s not worth it. Liam can fight his own battles.</p><p>So he washes up and he changes out of the clothes he’s slept in, into something else; a Marvel tee that people will undoubtedly give him flack for even though he knows for a fact half the class has been seeing the last couple of movies. He stands in front of the mirror and practises his smile and isn’t sure if he should be relieved or upset at how easy it is to paste on a convincing smile. </p><p>*</p><p>His first class is English Lit, and Liam tries to focus on the good. He likes the teacher. Mrs McLaine is nice. She’s smart and always makes the source material come to life, and in her class, most of the students are well behaved. She takes the time to listen, and Liam feels safe there. As safe as he does in school to begin with. He still doesn’t like speaking up in her class but that’s not because he is worried that she’ll mock him for his answers. It’s just that the same can’t be said for his peers.</p><p>But she always writes nice notes on his assignments, and sometimes when he catches her looking at him he thinks she might want to ask how he’s doing. He thinks she might also actually want to know the answer. She cares, and not just for the subject she teaches or because it’s in her contract to show some interest in the students. But just because of who she is as a person. </p><p>Liam’s considered talking to her, but he knows it’d get back to his parents, and they’ve got enough on their plate. But there’s this unspoken connection, where sometimes she gives him a look and depending on the day he smiles or he nods, and on those days that he gives a tiny shake of his head she doesn’t call on him in class. </p><p>He makes his way to his seat, head down as usual, ignoring the whispers around him because he can’t know for <em>sure</em> that they’re talking about him. He knows it’s just that years of being bullied has made him not only perceptive, it also made him suspicious, makes him feel self conscious and worried that every look, every hushed whisper or laugh, must have something to do with him.</p><p>One more day. After today, it’s just one more day, and then he gets a two day reprieve in the form of the weekend. And after that, it’s another week, but he can do this. He can if he just takes it day by day, class by class. There’s only three more months until the summer, and after that it’s just another year. He can <em>do</em> this.</p><p>The thing is, Liam doesn’t actually want to <em>die</em>. The thought that he’d come close last night is terrifying, and maybe that’s why he’d only gotten the pencil. Maybe what he’d gotten wasn’t important, it was that he'd had something to distract him from the path his mind was trying to lead him on. Maybe the fact that it had been something insignificant had shocked him enough that he hadn't been able to think about possible ways to end it, had been too busy figuring out the riddle instead. </p><p>It had helped. It had made him realize, as part of him was grateful to wake up this morning, that he doesn’t want to die, he just wants for it to <em>stop</em>.</p><p>He doesn't want to be sixteen, bullied every day, praying for his life to get better.</p><p>He wants to be twenty five and have his own place. </p><p>He wants to be thirty three and get married. </p><p>He wants to be fifty and watch his kids grow up. Watch how they navigate through life, secure in the knowledge that their parents love them and that they’ve always got them to fall back on. </p><p>He wants to be eighty seven and look back on his life and think that it was all worth it. That no matter how bleak it had seemed to be when he was in school, there were so many happy memories that had made his life worth living. </p><p>He doesn’t want to miss out on all of those experiences. Not when he knows it can get better. </p><p>He just needs something to hold onto.</p><p>*</p><p>Mrs McLaine has just started teaching - they’re getting into Modern Literature, and she’s laying out the lesson plan for the next couple of weeks - when there’s a knock on the door, a boy standing awkwardly next to the principal, who explains that this is the new student who’s just transferred from Tong Highschool in Bradford. </p><p>Liam’s reminded of just how much he likes Mrs McLaine when she doesn’t make the student introduce himself, just takes him aside for a moment to ask his name (and though Liam strains to hear it - with his eyes still firmly trained on his desk - he can’t quite make out the softly whispered reply) and then points him towards an empty desk.</p><p>The only empty desk in the class. </p><p>Which of course, considering his social standing, is right next to Liam. </p><p>As the boy makes his way to his seat, Mrs McLaine claps her hands, redirects the class' attention back to her. Liam glances at the boy from his corner of his eye, can tell that he’s tense in the way he holds himself, but that he relaxes a little bit at not having everyone stare at him anymore.</p><p>Liam knows what that’s like. He knows how stressful it can be to be the center of attention. It’s why he’s stopped singing. Even though he knows he’s got a good voice he can’t really stand to be looked at. Not when he’s always so aware. It feels like the moment someone looks at him he knows it, no matter how far away they are. </p><p>Case in point. The new boy next to him. Liam can tell that he’s looking at him, and he can’t help it, his body tenses, shoulders drawing up a little bit as though there’s any way of keeping himself safe from this unknown danger.</p><p>“Hey,” it’s quiet, whispered under his breath, and Liam wants to ignore it, he does, but he also doesn’t want Mrs McLaine to call on the boy and put both of them in the spotlight. So he just shifts his head a fraction, not quite making eye contact but letting the boy know he’s listening. He can just about see the start of a smile. “D’you happen to have a spare pencil? Think I lost mine.”</p><p>The look on Liam’s face must be incredulous, because the boy gives him a sheepish smile, now that he’s looking at him full on. “I know. Who comes to class without a pencil,” he mutters, and does this one shoulder shrug that thaws something in Liam’s heart. The movement is self deprecating, familiar, and he reaches into his bag without thinking about it. “I could’ve sworn I put it in there this morning. Double checked, even.” </p><p>He’s sure that Mrs McLaine has heard them whispering to each other by now, but she seems to pretend nothing’s happening, just continues lining out her lesson plan, as Liam’s fingers close around the pencil in his bag. </p><p><em>The</em> pencil. The pencil that he’s found in the lit up room. The thing that was supposedly what he needed most out of everything in the entire world.</p><p>For a moment he wonders if the boy knows, somehow. If this is part of that elaborate joke that the universe is playing on him, and any moment now he’ll laugh at him, and everyone will know just how gullible and foolish he is. </p><p>But the boy just takes the pencil that Liam’s shaky hand holds out to him, and he smiles with his tongue pressed to the back of his teeth, and he doesn’t look cruel. He just looks grateful, and Liam finds himself smiling maybe the first real smile he’s done in ages.</p><p>*</p><p>The boy’s name is Zayn, Liam learns at lunch. </p><p>Liam is used to sitting alone at lunch, if he even stays in the cafeteria. He keeps to himself, in a corner of the room, his back towards the windows so that he knows he only has to keep his eyes in front of him. Though he’s also learned that he usually gets left alone if he’s got a book in front of him and sticks close to the back of the room. It isn’t a foolproof measure, but it’s the best solution he’s come up with. </p><p>He’s still a bit jumpy, and as such, when he hears a “sick shirt, mate” he nearly drops his spoon in his chili, his bristles already up because he just wants to be left <em>alone</em>, do they really need to ruin lunch for him today? </p><p>Except when he looks up, it’s the boy from English Lit standing next to his table, holding his own lunch tray and giving him another of those sheepish smiles. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.” He seems hesitant, not making a move to step closer but also not backing away. “Would it be okay if I sat here? I know you’re reading, we don’t have to talk. It’s just-” he does that one shoulder shrug again, and Liam finds himself reacting instinctively, just like he’d done in class this morning. His nod is short and jerky, and the boy doesn’t finish his sentence, but he does give Liam another one of those smiles as he sits down. “Thanks mate.”</p><p>Liam, just like before, finds himself giving him a small smile back. “No problem,” he says, and for a moment he wonders if it would be rude to go back to his book. It’s not even that he really wants to. It’s just, with everything that’s been going on in his life in the past couple of years he’s not sure if he even remembers how to make conversation. He struggles to find something to say, even to his family sometimes. </p><p>The boy must pick up on it, because he bites down delicately on his bottom lip (not that Liam is looking) before extending his hand towards him. “I’m Zayn.” He glances at his own hand, then drops it, and Liam feels a familiar pang in his stomach. </p><p>“Liam.” He says quietly. Then, because just saying his name feels dismissive, his brain short circuits and decides to make him make a fool of himself. “I am. Is who I am, I mean. Liam. That’s my name.” </p><p>Things like this have been enough to get him made fun of in the past, because at this rate, even existing has become enough of a reason, but Zayn doesn’t make fun of him. He giggles, yes, but it doesn’t sound malicious. “Nice to meet you Liam,” he says, and then his smile fades a bit, though his eyes stay friendly and curious. “You sound more nervous than me, mate, and I was shitting bricks coming here this morning.”</p><p>Liam bites down on his lip. “I’m not good with people,” he explains, and he feels it now, that darkness that’s always in the background, eager for another chance to ensnare a piece of his heart, his soul. “You, um, you sure you want to sit here? I’m not exactly, like, popular. It’s not gonna help you much in the way of settling in, being seen with me.” </p><p>Zayn’s eyes grow soft, and there’s a tone in his voice that Liam is so used to attributing to bad things, but there’s something inside of him that can tell it for what it is somehow. Teasing. Which is so different from bullying, but it’s been years since Liam’s heard the difference. “You mean sitting alone is not what the popular kids do these days?” He arches an eyebrow, and Liam feels flustered, feels like even if he knows Zayn doesn’t mean it badly (he thinks he does, at least, but there’s always a part of him that doubts it, that wants to go on the defensive just in case) he should still show him that Liam’s not asking for pity, nor is he unaware of his social status. He doesn’t need anyone rubbing it in. But Zayn’s expression isn’t malicious, and his words are soft when he continues. “I don’t exactly have the best experience with popular kids,” he says. “I figured I’d take a gamble on the nice boy who let me borrow his pencil in class and who wears a shirt from arguably the best franchise in the world. Figured maybe my chances of making friends with him were a bit better.”</p><p>It’s so earnest, and sweet, and Liam wants to warn him off, he truly does, because being friends with him isn’t going to help Zayn, is only going to ostracize him, and Zayn has a chance here. But he can’t help but think back on last night. On how alone he’d felt. On how he’d needed something to change, and how the thing he’d apparently needed most in the entire world was a pencil. </p><p>So he doesn’t warn him off. He just gives him a smile, tentative but real, and tucks his book in his bag. “I’d like that,” he whispers, and if it’s a little bit breathless and shaky, Zayn doesn’t call him on it. He just returns Liam’s smile, and Liam feels like it’s getting just a little bit easier to breathe. Finds that for once, being seen by someone isn’t that awful. “You can keep the pencil, if you like,” he offers. </p><p>He doesn’t think he’ll really need it anymore. Sitting here with Zayn, even when their alliance could just be temporary, feels like a reprieve from the storm. Finding the pencil had been upsetting, and he’d been so sure that this was a mistake, or some joke, and that something that small could never make a difference. But now he knows he was wrong. The pencil did have a purpose, and it seems to have served it.</p><p>It’s given him hope. </p><p>*</p><p>Their alliance is not temporary. </p><p>Zayn feels like the missing piece of his soul, right from the get go. They bond over Marvel movies and their shared history of being bullied. Over music and art and growing up with all sisters. </p><p>They bond over their sexuality, once Liam finally feels secure enough to tell him. </p><p>He still gets bullied in school, but with Zayn by his side he’s no longer alone. He keeps his head held high, and even though people mock them in the hallways, call them names and insinuate things that make Liam’s ears redden, it’s easier to bear. </p><p>Zayn never leaves his side. He’s there to walk Liam home from school, he’s there when he gets tripped in the hallway, when they try to corner him after gym. He’s got a quiet strength that Liam can draw from, and bit by bit, it gets easier. </p><p>They become friends. Best friends. Liam is there for Zayn when people bully him too, and when he tries apologizing for it, sure that just being Liam’s friend has painted a target on his back, Zayn draws him in for a hug and tells him it’s still loads better than it had been in Bradford. </p><p>(Liam still occasionally apologizes, after a particularly bad day, but he’s started believing Zayn when he tells him it isn’t his fault)</p><p>All those things he’d wanted to achieve, he does.</p><p>At twenty five, he has his own place. He’s studied to become a teacher, wants to make a difference like Mrs McLaine had taught him was possible. He wants to be that safe haven for someone, not just for his friends (because yes, he has friends now, though no one can ever quite come close to the bond he has with Zayn) but for kids, young and impressionable kids who might need that same hope that Liam had so desperately searched for when he was sixteen.</p><p>Okay, he doesn’t <em>quite</em> have his own place. He shares it, with Zayn. </p><p>Who, from ally, had gone to friend. Best friend. And over the years, lover.</p><p>At twenty seven, they add another term to describe one another.</p><p>Husband.</p><p>Liam doesn’t need to wait until he’s thirty three to see his wedding day. Nor does he need to wait until he’s fifty to see his kids grow up, let alone eighty seven to look back on and appreciate all the good things that have happened to him in his life. Living life with Zayn is an ongoing lesson in appreciating the good, and working together to counter the bad. </p><p>Liam had always tried to keep hope, that one day things would get better. The hope had come in the form of a key, for most of his teenage years. Briefly in the form of a pencil. </p><p>These days, hope comes in the form of a warm smile, tongue pressed to the back of teeth. </p><p>It comes in morning kisses, lazy and intimate, or quick and barely there. It comes in soft expressions and gentle smiles, in fingers that tangle with his in an ever present reminder that together, they can weather any storm.</p><p>But more than anything, hope comes in the form of the wedding ring around his finger; bronze instead of gold, to remind Liam of everything that had happened in his life, and of just how strong he is. </p><p>He’s made it through so much, and with Zayn at his side, he’ll make it through a million things more before his life is over. He won’t have the key anymore, won’t have the last resort that he might need if the situation gets truly desperate. But he doesn’t need it. </p><p>Because he’s got Zayn. But most of all, because he’s got <em>himself</em>. </p><p>And he’s finally <em>happy</em>.</p><p>-fin-</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>If you liked this fic, please give it a kudo or a comment or come talk to me about it on my <a href="https://so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed.tumblr.com/">Tumblr</a>.<br/>Please also consider reblogging the <a href="https://so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed.tumblr.com/post/623542327248568320/sadness-is-a-little-boy-looking-out-the-window">fic post</a>, and reading the other works in this collection!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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